The Hardy Boys Wiki:Manual of Style
The Hardy Boys Wiki's Manual of Style is a collection of guidelines and rules of thumb that are designed to set a rough standard for the appearances of all articles. Although style is generally not considered the most important factor in the writing of an article, it is an important factor in the writing of good articles. The manual of style is designed to make articles easier to read and comprehend, to make articles better organized and easier to edit. Above all, realize that these rules are not set in stone! They are considered guidelines for making an article appear more attractive to the reader, to make them easier to work with. If you think you have a better way of writing your article, by all means go ahead and be bold! And add your own idea on this page as an additional option for adding style to an article. (However, please don't remove existing guidelines, just add your own new ones.) If you're looking for information on how to write an article in wiki markup, please see for instructions. As that article is more about how to use markup, this article is concerned about the when, where, and why of using specific markup. Please also read the Guide to Layout for suggestions on how to organize your article. In all cases, examples of styles will be indented from the main margin for emphasis. In-universe point of view The Hardy Boys Wiki's main point of view is a character in the Hardy World. When writing in-universe articles think of characters as if they are real people and the events as if they really happened. In short think of The Hardy Boys Wiki, as a an encyclopedia that exists in the Hardy World, an encyclopedia that if they ever googled "hardy boys wiki", they themselves could read! In-universe articles include: *Characters *Locations *Businesses, etc *Other Hardy World subjects *Books Note that only the plot summary section of book articles should be written in-universe, and the rest should be from a real-life point of view (see below for more info). Tense Events which take place in a book should be written in past tense, as if you are looking back at those events. All characters should be written about as if they are living people (unless of course they died in the story), so in present tense, with the age they are in their most current appearance being their "current age". Example: "Frank Hardy is the 18 year old son of Fenton Hardy. He and his brother Joe are both detectives. They solved their first case when school friend Perry Robinson's father was a suspect in a local crime.'' Conflicts and continuity problems Often information is given in one book, and in a later book is contradicted. Chet Morton's hair color is an example; in some books it is said to be red, while in others it is said to be brown, or even blond. To reduce confusion, subjects which have appeared in more then one continuity are split into separate articles for each continuity in which they appear (see below for more info). Note that this does not entirely solve the problem, since conflicting information is often given within a continuity and even a series. If this is the case, and there are subjects that have conflicting or contradictory references, simply add all the given information, and for clarity add a real-life point of view note explaining that there is a conflict. If there is a sufficient amount of information, it should be contained in a separate section, named: : Real-life information or Comments Real world point of view The second point of view on The Hardy Boys Wiki is "real life" or "real world". This point of view is for subjects not within the Hardy's world (e.g. authors, books, series, publishing companies, TV shows, actors, computer games, etc). Tense should be the same as a standard encyclopedia in the present day. Examples of real life of point of view are: :"Dead on Target is the first book in the The Hardy Boys Casefiles series. It was first published in April 1987 by Archway Paperbacks." :"Scott Lobdell is an American comic book writer. All real world articles should include the tag. Book articles Articles concerning Hardy Boys books, TV episodes and computer games are a special case. Although they are covered by the real-life point of view, plot summary sections are written from an in-universe point of view. Other sections, including the sidebar and background information sections, should be written from a standard "real life" point of view. Continuities The Hardy Boys book series are generally divided up into three separate continuities. In addition there are the continuities of the four Hardy Boys TV series, and a computer game continuity. The continuities are as follows: Book continuities :Original ::The Hardy Boys (Original series) ::The Hardy Boys (Digest series) :Casefiles ::The Hardy Boys Casefiles ::Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys SuperMystery ::Hardy Boys and Tom Swift Ultra Thriller :Undercover Brothers ::The Hardy Boys Undercover Brothers ::The Hardy Boys Undercover Brothers Super Mystery ::Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys Super Mystery ::The Hardy Boys Graphic Novel TV continuities :1950s TV serials :1969 TV show :1977 TV show :1995 TV show Computer game continuities :Nancy Drew computer games As mentioned above, subjects which have appeared in more then one of these continuities are split up into separate articles for each continuity. This helps organize the different information given in each continuity. For example, the original Nancy Drew article read: Nancy Drew is an amateur detective and a friend of Frank and Joe Hardy. She first met the Hardy brothers when they were working undercover at a rock concert for ATAC. Nancy found out about their work with ATAC and she and her best friends, Bess and George, helped them solve the mystery. *Note: *''In the Casefiles Continuity they met when Nancy was an exchange student at Bayport High, as mentioned in Double Crossing. *''In the Original Continuity it is unknown how the Hardy Boys met Nancy Drew, except that she is a friend of Karen Young, the niece of Frank and Joe's Uncle, as mentioned in The Secret Of Mountaintop Inn in the Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys Super Sleuths! Volume 1. However, the TV episode The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew Meet Dracula could have been considered by the writers of the Super Sleuths! and Be A Detective to have been the first meeting between the three characters. As you can see, many notes were needed, making the article confusing and hard to understand. But splitting up this article would fix these problems. Nancy Drew (Original) Nancy Drew is an amateur detective and a friend of Frank and Joe Hardy. Nancy Drew (Casefiles) Nancy Drew is an amateur detective and a friend of Frank and Joe Hardy. She first met the Hardy brothers as when she was an exchange student at their school, Bayport High. Nancy Drew (Undercover Brothers) Nancy Drew is an amateur detective and a friend of Frank and Joe Hardy. She first met the Hardy brothers when they were working undercover at a rock concert for ATAC. Nancy found out about their work with ATAC and she and her best friends, Bess and George, helped them solve the mystery. Nancy Drew (1977 TV show) Nancy Drew is an amateur detective and a friend of Frank and Joe Hardy. She first met the boys, when working on a case for her father which involved the Hardy boys' father Fenton Hardy. As you can see, no more foot notes are needed, and all articles are more readable. Another good example of how confusing an article can be if it is not split up is an article about Iola Morton, a character who is Joe's girlfriend in one continuity, is Joe's deceased former girlfriend in another, and in yet another is alive but not Joe's girlfriend! An article like this would be near impossible to keep in-universe. Introducing an article At the beginning of every article, the title or subject of that article should be bold in the first line. Even though the article title is already listed, it is useful to emphasize the article's subject for the reader. (Don't forget to also use italicized text when necessary. See Manual of Style/Titles for further information.) :Ezra Collig is the Chief of the Bayport Police Department. He often works closely with private investigator Fenton Hardy and his two sons, Frank and Joe. If the subject of the article has more than one name, each new form of the name should be in bold on its first appearance. :Q.T. or just Q''' is the director of ATAC. In most cases, it is useful to establish context in the first line or two of the article. :'''Frank Hardy is the older of the two Hardy boys... Characters and actors Because there have been a number Hardy Boys television series, numerous actors have played the main characters. For example, Frank has been played or voiced by more then five different actors over the years. The best way to give the actors credit is to add a section called: : Portrayals This section should list the actors that have played the character, in order of series. :In the Mickey Mouse Club Hardy Boys Television series Frank was played by Tim Considine :Frank was played by Rick Gates in the failed 1967 pilot. Headlines and sections To create a new in an article, surround the text with two or more (equal signs). When you have the header, there is no blank line needed beneath the header. The wiki engine will automatically create a table of contents based on the headers in an article. In all cases, you should capitalize the first word and all proper nouns of the header, and leave all other words lowercase. Avoid using links in headers. Depending on the browser's default settings, some users may not be able to see the links properly. It is much more useful to place the appropriate link in the first sentence after the header. See also * Manual of Style/Headings Paragraphs and formatting Inexperienced writers have a tendency towards "run on" paragraphs. Some of these may number dozens of lines and many column inches without a break. This makes the articles difficult to read as everything seems to flow together. It also makes it tough to quickly skim articles for data points. A good paragraph (grammatically speaking) is two to five sentences in length on average. It covers one thought or idea or piece of information. Any time there is a change in the thought, idea, or piece of information, there should also be a paragraph change. When formatting paragraphs, adding an empty line between paragraphs looks better in the articles than the traditional "paragraph indent" on the first line. It makes for a more definite "break point" visually, and allows the reader to more easily see that they are reading a new paragraph at that point. As an example of what NOT to do, here's every thing just typed done as one big block (the way many articles tend to be done): :Inexperienced writers have a tendency towards "run on" paragraphs. Some of these may number dozens of lines and many column inches without a break. This makes the articles difficult to read as everything seems to flow together. It also makes it tough to quickly skim articles for data points. A good paragraph (grammatically speaking) is 2-5 sentences in length on average. It covers ''one thought or idea/piece of information. Any time there is a change in the thought/idea/piece of information, there should also be a paragraph change. When formatting paragraphs, adding an empty line between paragraphs looks better in the articles than the traditional "paragraph indent" on the first line. It makes for a more definite "break point" visually, and allows the reader to more easily see that they are reading a new paragraph at that point.'' Book article style *'See' Manual of Style/Book articles List style *'See' Manual of Style/Lists Title style *'See' Manual of Style/Titles Table styles *'See' Manual of Style/Tables Quotations When quoting a person in an article, if the quote is at least a full sentence, the quotation template should be used. However, if the quote is just a single word or a sentence fragment, it should not be italicized. : "…she entered her cookies at the State Fair?" asked Aunt Gertrude. For uniformity and to avoid problems with the wiki software and the search utility, use straight quotation marks and apostrophes, and avoid curved marks such as the backtick or so-called "smart quotes". Punctuation marks should be placed inside of the quotation marks, unless the quotation marks surround a title (ie, episode, comic, etc). See also and Related topics Informational references to related articles that have not been linked to from free links in the article itself are best handled by the "see also" header. :See also: Casefiles Alternatively, you can use a "Related topics" or "See also" section header to list the links in a more explicit fashion as a section of the article: : See also :*Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys Be a Detective Mystery Story :*Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys Super Mystery Other styles There are undoubtedly styles that this tutorial does not cover. Although we try to keep this article simple, consider adding a new section to help new (and old!) readers out in creating styles for articles. When all else fails, we recommend referring to the "official" resources for styles, such as The Chicago Manual of Style or Fowler's Modern English Usage. Keep it simple Above all else, you are encouraged to keep your articles simple! Don't try to get too fancy with your markup (like embedding tables within tables). The easier the markup is, the easier it will be for anyone to edit the article later on. Our first goal is to reliably and accurately display the information. The goal of wiki markup is to keep the articles simple and to emphasize the information as much as possible. We prefer content over form! For this and other reasons, HTML markup should be avoided in most circumstances. Spelling and Style Choices Because The Hardy Boys is an American novel series, The Hardy Boys Wiki has chosen to use American spellings of words rather than British spellings. See also Before you start editing or creating new pages, we encourage you to read through and understand the following documents (if you haven't already): * is a basic introduction to wiki markup. * Naming conventions is an article on how to properly name articles. :This guideline is closely based on Memory Alpha's Manual of Style. Manual of Style